How to Make A Life
by SomewhereApart
Summary: Mason makes her feel like a mother - like she's ready for this. Like she can handle having one of her own. So she decides it's time, and takes the plunge. Another exploration of Charlotte havin' a baby - with much less stress and drama than the other work-in-progress. Set sometime after season 5.
1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:** _I know, I know. ANOTHER one. And ANOTHER baby one on top of it. This one is all on Afrouz. Blame HER. _

_Also, this more a series of vignettes than an actually story. It will follow a currently pregnant Charlotte – currently as in during a fictional season 6ish time frame. I can't guarantee the speed w/ which I will update it. I can't guarantee a strong through-line other than that eventually she'll be poppin' out a kid. I don't know how many chapters it will be. This is a pregnancy brain-dump for me. I've gotta get some of these ideas out of my head._

_So. Here we go again. I promise to work on _Suddenly Everything Just Changed_ tomorrow._

* * *

She does it all behind his back, even though she's vowed to try her damnedest not to do that to him anymore. But she can make an exception this time - she knows it. On this one matter, she doesn't have to ask his approval - he's made his feelings perfectly clear, time and time again over the years, and she's fairly certain having Mason around hasn't changed things. It's illicit, and sneaky, and she gets a little thrill over lying to him, over having to keep up the appearances that things are normal while her body adjusts to handling its own rhythm for the first time in decades.

She still buys her birth control pills, flushes one every day. To keep up appearances. She wants to surprise him, and it's no good if he finds her out before she's ready. Before she's successful. She wants to see the look on his face when she tells him. She's only plannin' on doing this once, and she wants it on her terms, damn it. No months of disappointment when that second blue line doesn't show up - not for him. No crestfallen looks when she starts bleeding. No being unable to resist telling their son and roping him into the roller coaster of emotions right along with them.

Mason's the real variable here, to be honest — whether he's ready after all he's been through. Whether this kind of change is bad for him. Whether he deserves to be the only kid for a while longer. She weighs her options, thinks long and hard, and frowns over him day after day. In the end, though, it's her biological clock that decides for her. Three months to the day after Erica dies, she decides she's getting older by the minute and can't afford to wait anymore. The longer she waits, the higher the risk of complications, and the higher the risk of complications, the more stressful this becomes for all three of them. Health risks, a dangerously high risk of C-section, the necessity of painkillers afterward - even under medically sanctioned conditions - and the potential disaster that can bring down on all of them. She tells herself that by the time she gets pregnant and carries the baby, Mason will have had well over a year to adjust, and it will just have to be enough.

So she can lie, she can sneak, she can keep up the ruse. For once, her penchant for secrecy comes in handy.

It's harder than she thinks it'll be - it turns out her body's not all that regular on its own anymore, and her periods come and go as they please for the first few months. Six weeks in between, then three, then seven, then two. It's frustrating - made doubly infuriating by her body's betraying rebellion every time it's gearing up to go. She's never been immune to PMS, but she's fallin' prey to it more than ever now. Headaches, and backaches, and cramps that make her want to curl up in bed all day and cry, or reach for a pill she knows she can't have to ease the pain. She muscles through it, doubling up on ibuprofen and Midol, forcing a smile when she wants to dig her uterus out and throw it across the room instead of bear one more minute of it squeezing and punishing her. If Cooper ever notices something is amiss, he never says anything.

She considers it a testament to her stealth.

When it finally happens, she's remarkably unprepared. It doesn't even occur to her that she might be pregnant until someone else suggests it. She hasn't had a period in five weeks, but that's not all that uncommon lately, and the yo-yo of _am-I-or-aren't-I?_ has left her so emotionally drained that she decides to take a round off and not sneak her usual monthly pregnancy test. Less pressure, less of a let down when she isn't. Again. She's been thinkin' how she'll have to tell him soon, how if this keeps up without success they might have to consider a more intentional approach to baby-makin' than a whole lot of sex and a little bit of prayer.

She's tired - exhausted, really. Draggin' her ass through the day on the power of coffee alone, so many cups she's jittery all day. When her stomach takes a turn for the worse, she figures it's the overload of coffee, the exhaustion, maybe a touch of the flu.

And then Jake smirks at her, and teases, "Maybe you're pregnant," and she rolls her eyes and smiles while on the inside everything clicks into place.

"I think I'd know if I was pregnant," she tells him, at the same time sayin' to herself, _Maybe I'm finally pregnant._

"You'd be surprised," Jake says, grabbing his coffee and leaving the kitchen. He doesn't mean anything by it, but he's made it all crystal clear for her. She's begun to learn her unpredictable body, and this is a whole new set of symptoms. This is different. This could be it.

The rest of the day passes slow as molasses, jam-packed with back-to-back appointments and meetings that leave her no time for a pregnancy test - at least, not at a time that nobody will notice. It's her turn to pick Mason up from school, and it's not until she has him in his room, settled in with some lengthy math homework, that she gets a minute to herself.

She locks herself in the bathroom, opens the drawer that houses her make-up, the birth control she's been shunning for months, brushes and combs, and all the way in the back - her emergency pregnancy test. She tears it open, thinks of rivers and waterfalls and all that crap. Then she waits. She's had a good mess of agonizingly long two-minute waits in the last few months, but this one seems longest. She counts it out, second-by-second, to give herself something to do.

When the time finally passes, she says a silent prayer, then looks down at the test. Two distinct lines stare back at her and she grins, a sudden, sharp surge of emotion choking her for a second. Her eyes well with tears, and she blinks hard to clear them, takes a deep breath.

It's over. She did it.

She's pregnant.

Finally.


	2. Chapter 2

For all her planning and forethought, she never managed to figure out just exactly how she should break the big news to Cooper. She knows she doesn't want to just come out with it, she wants to find something special. Something worthy of this once-in-their-lifetime thing.

In the end, she settles on Mason. He has to be involved, not only because it will thrill Cooper to no end, but because she wants to make sure that he feels like he's a part of all this. She's had plenty of time to ponder all the ways a new baby could make him feel insecure, and the one she's most concerned about is the idea that he might feel like an outsider now. That he might think she sees him as less now that theres a shiny new baby on the way. That he might worry she'll care more about a baby she carries herself.

So she wants him in on this. Wants him to take an active role right from the beginning. It requires making him an accomplice, but that's just fine with her. They've always made a good team.

As fate would have it, Cooper gets stuck at the hospital with a patient before the week is out, and Charlotte has a whole night alone with Mason. Just the two of them. Perfect.

They pick up burgers, and the smell makes her oddly queasy. She relishes the feeling for the first five minutes - more proof that this is really happening. That her plan is finally in motion. After that, though, the bloom falls off the rose and she's just left wondering how long it will take to get the heavy, greasy smell out of her car.

By the time they get home, she feels overly warm and unsteady, her mouth full of too much spit. She sends Mason off to the kitchen with their dinner, and hopes to make it upstairs to her own bathroom before she revisits her lunch. No such luck - a violent roll of her stomach sends her beelining for the downstairs john. She hurls up her first round of "morning" sickness, acutely aware that she's within earshot of the kitchen, and even if she'd wanted to keep this whole pregnancy business a secret from her son, the jig is up now. He'll be worried that she's sick, and she'll have to tell him.

Sure enough, when she's steady enough to head for the kitchen, she finds him sitting at the table, poking his fries around with a deep, concerned scowl on his face.

"What's wrong with you?" he asks her, and she can't think past the meaty smell of the kitchen and the way it makes her belly turn again, so she beckons him out onto the back patio where she can get some air while he eats. He sees it as a stall, and gives her a look of resentment she hasn't gotten from him in ages.

"There's somethin' I need to tell you," she explains once they're settled, offering an assurance, "It's nothin' bad, I'm not sick, but I am gonna need you to keep it a secret for me, for just a little while."

"You mean don't tell my dad." He's still fiddling with his fries, not eating - he was starving before, but now he can't seem to bring himself to take a bite. She wishes she'd gotten a chance to tell him before she hurled. She wishes he'd never been given a reason to be so scared in the first place.

"That's what I mean, yeah. I want us to tell him together."

"If you're not sick, why are you throwing up?"

He doesn't commit himself to secret-keeping, not yet, and she figures that's probably fair. She has a feeling he'll be on her side once he knows the whole truth.

"Because I'm pregnant," she tells him plainly, and he looks up at her suddenly, then back down at his fries. "You're going to be a big brother."

"Oh."

"And I haven't told your daddy yet. I thought maybe you could help me - I know he'd really like that. You helpin' me tell him. And I'd like it too."

He's still staring at his fries, his face worked back into that troubled scowl, and she wonders if she's managed to bungle this whole thing already.

He doesn't say anything for a while, so she coaxes, "Mase?"

Finally, he says, "You guys are having your own baby?" quietly, and without any hint of pleasure or excitement, and Charlotte's heart breaks for him.

She reaches over and tugs his chin up with her fingertips, until she can see his face. "Hey," she protests gently, "It's not like that. Not for your daddy, and not for me. Look at me, Mason." He does. "_You_ are my son. You are my own. I promised your Momma I'd love you like you're mine, and it was an easy promise to make, because I was already crazy about you."

"Yeah, but..." He sighs, slumps in his chair. "It's gonna be different. You're gonna be this baby's mom for real."

She doesn't know what to say to him. Searches for something, anything, that can reassure him, and what she comes up with is a memory of Big Daddy, one that's resurfaced time and time again in the time since they inherited Mason. "Y'know, my Daddy... he wasn't really a talker. But I was goin' through a really hard time once, and he said somethin' to me that I never forgot. I'd always been his favorite, and he told me it wasn't because I was his only girl, or because I did well in school, or any of that. It was because I was his first child. He said there's nothin' like your first kid, because that's the one that teaches you what it means to be a parent. That's when you learn how to be scared like you never knew you could be scared, or to love somethin' like you never knew you could love. He said I blew his whole damned heart open the day I was born, and he was never the same."

Mason's chin quivers and she watches him grit his teeth to hide it, and wonders if he's always done that or if it's a habit he's managed to pick up from her.

"Look at me," she urges again, because she wants him to hear this, really hear it. He does, and his eyes are watery. "You are the kid that taught me to be a parent. _You_. You have scared the crap outta me, and broken my heart, and made me laugh, and cry, and... I had no idea I could even be a Momma until you came along. So you are my first kid, Mason. You are the special one. And your daddy and I could have a million babies, and it wouldn't change that. You will always be the kid that made me a Momma, you will always be your daddy's first son, and my first son, and nothin' can take that away from you. Nothin'." He seems mollified by that, at least a little bit, so she traces her fingers through his hair and asks, "You hear me?"

"You promise?"

"Cross my heart," she assures.

He takes a deep breath, and nods, pulling himself together and reaching for his fries. And just like that, he seems to be over it. He shoves three fries into his mouth, and chews, and asks around a mouthful, "So how do you wanna tell my dad?"

Charlotte grimaces, and relaxes back into her seat, asking, "Could you chew your food before you talk, please?"

He shrugs, and swallows, and opens his mouth and shows her his tongue.

"Ugh." She reaches over and turns his head away, and he laughs at her. "I don't know how yet. I was hopin' you could help me figure that out."

He nods, and tells her, "I'll think about it. We'll come up with something cool."

Charlotte nods, tells him that sounds good, and slouches a little further in her chair, letting her head rest against the chair back behind her, and closing her eyes. She's still battling the exhaustion of early pregnancy, and it's creepin' up on her again right now.

"Aren't you gonna eat dinner?" he asks her, and she cracks her eyes back open, and looks at him.

"Nah," she admits with a grimace. "The burger smell's makin' me queasy."

"Oh."

He looks guiltily down at his dinner, and she assures him, "It's fine out here. There's enough fresh air to compensate."

"Okay." He takes a bite of his burger, and she sees the moment he thinks of something he wants to say, but then he looks at her, and works his jaw furiously, chewing and chewing until he's okay to swallow. Charlotte smirks, and murmurs a thank you. And then he's finally able to ask, "Are you gonna puke all the time now? Because that was gross."

Charlotte laughs, shaking her head and telling him, "Man, I hope not. I'm just hittin' the barfy phase, I think. I'm hopin' it doesn't get too bad."

"Me too," he says, with this look that makes it clear he's not fond of the vomit symphony filtering in from the next room.

She chuckles again, and shuts her eyes, but she doesn't want to fall asleep, so she keeps talking. "I'm really tired, though. I hear that'll last a while, so I don't want you to worry if I'm not feelin' myself, or if I rest a lot, or if I do get sick sometimes. Makin' a whole 'nother person is hard work. But I'm gonna be alright. Okay?"

"Okay." His voice is muffled by a mouthful of burger, and she makes a face at him without opening her eyes.

"You think just because I can't see you, it doesn't still sound gross?" she questions, and Mason laughs again.

She smiles, and drops her hand to her abdomen, settling it against the still-flat plane of her belly. All things considered, this went relatively well, and she's glad she was able to allay Mason's fears. To comfort him, the way a Momma ought to. Despite her best intentions, she starts to drift off after a minute, Mason's voice pulling her back.

"Hey, Momma - I think I know how we should tell my dad."

Charlotte opens her eyes again, and smiles.

"Oh yeah? What're you thinkin'?"


	3. Chapter 3

Cooper doesn't arrive home until ten past ten, so he's surprised to see the kitchen light on, to hear snickering and the low voices of his wife and son. Charlotte's a stickler for bedtime - 9:30 sharp, ten if she's feeling generous and it's not a school night. The last few weeks, whatever bug she's been fighting has had her so worn down that she's not far behind.

He's not complaining tonight, though. It's rare he's not home by Mason's bedtime, and he hates to think of an entire day lost without any time with his kid. So he heads for the kitchen first, not even taking the time to drop his messenger bag.

They're parked at the kitchen table, peering at a piece of paper between them, a pencil in Mason's hand. Mason is in his worn out Pokemon pajamas; Charlotte's in sweats and a tank top. So bedtime must not be far off, then. Charlotte looks up when he walks in, and smiles.

"There he is," she greets. "Mason wanted to wait up until you got home."

Cooper smiles through a pang of guilt, drops his bag on the table and settles into the empty chair on Mason's other side. "Well, here I am. Think we can talk your Momma into letting you stay up a little longer?"

Mason looks at Charlotte and grins winningly. "I bet we can. Right, Momma?" For good measure, he adds a long, drawn-out, "Please?"

Charlotte smirks and nods, agreeing, "Sure. For a little while."

Mason turns to Cooper and gives him an enthusiastic high five. For it being this late in the evening, the kid sure has a lot of energy. In fact, it's infectious, and Cooper finds himself grinning too, the lingering exhaustion of a long day almost forgotten. God, he's grateful for this kid.

He slings an arm across the back of Mason's chair and asks, "So what are we doing?" As he nods his head toward the paper they'd been looking at, he gets his answer: they're on their fourth round of hangman.

"Hangman," Mason answers, turning the paper toward his dad, so he can get a better view. Round one was obviously Charlotte: the word is "mathematics." Mason followed with "Scraggy" - no surprise there. After that, Charlotte's "ice cream sandwich," and finally, the current game: "c_oco_a_e cake."

Cooper knows the answer immediately: chocolate cake.

"When we're done, I want to play with you, too, okay, Dad?" he asks, and Mason looks at Charlotte as he tells him sure, absolutely, they can go a few rounds. She turns her attention back to the paper and mulls over her letter choices. She already has a head, a torso, a leg and an arm hanging, so she can afford a few mistakes - but not too many. She doesn't need them, though. Cooper can tell by the way she's making a show of this whole thing that she already knows. She's just drawing it out for the fun of it.

She goes for it, finally, declaring the letter H, and then immediately L and T. It's like she was waiting for him to get home before she finished Mason off.

Mason groans and vows, "One of these days, I'm gonna stump you."

"Wouldn't be the first time," Charlotte chuckles, pushing back her chair and standing with a stretch. She rolls her neck, and yawns, and Cooper thinks she looks tired. She always looks tired lately, but the few times he's pointed it out to her, she's gotten a little... grumpy. That's the nice word for it, anyway. So he's let her be about it, for the most part. He's keeping an eye on her, trying to look for anything remarkably out of the ordinary, but as far as he can tell, she's simply not well-rested. He has a sneaking suspicion that she's being plagued by nightmares. She goes through phases sometimes, ever since the assault - rough weeks that find her awake in the middle of the night more often than not. She's gotten good at hiding them, but he can usually tell. She'll be irritable, and overtired, and go to a lot more meetings with Amelia.

So he thinks maybe that's what's going on now, and maybe he should give her time and space to process. To deal. To not have it pointed out and poked at during the day. If it lasts another week, he'll say something.

For now, though, he turns his attention back to Mason, who has declared that he gets to choose the first phrase, and is carefully drawing out his blanks. In his peripheral, Cooper sees Charlotte grab her empty glass and head for the fridge.

Mason's phrase is unusually long - seven words, granted some of them are one or two letters. He looks all smug and proud of himself, so Cooper cracks his knuckles, squares his shoulders, and mutters, "Alright, let's do this..." before staring down the page. He goes with the obvious letters first: A, E, I, O, and U. It gets him to "I'_ _oi_ _o _e a _i_ _o_e_," and gives Charlotte enough time to refill her glass with ice water and settle into her chair again.

She peeks at the page and supplies, "B," and Cooper scowls at her. "Hey!" he scolds. "My round, not yours. You're gonna waste one of my letters on B?"

"You have a two letter word ending in E," she points out, and when he looks back at the page, he discovers her B has actually hit some paydirt. There's a surprising three of them, and now they're up to "I'_ _oi_ _o be a bi_ b_o_e_."

Okay, fair point," he concedes, looking over the letters again. He goes with D, figures it's a safe bet to fill that first word, or the two-letter-ending-in-O. It earns him a torso to go with his already swinging head. Damnit. Safe bet then is M - Sure enough, the first word is "I'm." A safe T finishes his two-letter, and adds to the last word. Now he's working with "I'm _oi_ to be a bi_ b_ot_e_."

If the "bi_" isn't "bid" or "bit," chances are it's "big," so he goes for G and scores well again. "I'm goi_g to be a big b_ot_e_." The N is a no-brainer, and suddenly Cooper is staring at "I'm going to be a big b_ot_e_," and his heart skips a beat. He looks up at Charlotte, and she stage whispers, "try an R," and Cooper's mouth goes dry. He clears his throat, says "R" and it becomes "I'm going to be a big brot_er."

He doesn't need the H to know how it ends.

He looks between the two of them, Mason's satisfied smirk and Charlotte's cat-got-the-canary smile, and he knows. "I'm going to be a big brother?" he manages, and Mason fills in the final letter, and shakes his head.

"Nope," Mason denies jokingly, and Cooper can't even spare him a glance, because he's too busy looking dumbfoundedly at his wife. "But I am!"

Mason laughs and Cooper feels a jolt of adrenaline: She's pregnant. Mason is going to be a big brother, because Charlotte is pregnant.

"Are you serious?" he breathes, and she nods, her smile widening.

"Mmhmm."

"_Are you serious?!_" he asks again, louder, halfway to a shout, but it's really starting to hit him now, and oh, my god, she's finally, finally pregnant! His wife - his wife who never wanted babies is pregnant _right now!_

She laughs out loud at that, all joyful and amused, and tells him, "Yes, we're serious," and Cooper can't help himself. He reaches forward and crushes them both into a tight hug, his heart beating double-time, breath caught in his throat. It's entirely possible he's about to cry.

"Ahhh, I'm squished," Mason laughs from between them, and Cooper can't bear to let them go just yet - his family, his perfect, wonderful, about-to-get-just-a-little-bigger family.

"Deal with it," he tells his son, and then Charlotte's laughing again too, and giving him a little shove.

"Let the kid breathe," she urges, shaking her head, and as Cooper tugs Mason to him again for just a second, planting a kiss on his hair, she reaches for her water again and takes another slow sip. Her eyes close for a second and through the elation - the thrill like nothing he's ever felt before - he sees her. Really sees her. She's never been more beautiful, ever. She's stunning. She's amazing.

"How did this happen?" he asks her, because they've been over this before, and she's never been on board with it. They haven't talked about it since before they found out Erica was sick; it was nowhere near his radar. Just a pipe dream. Just a someday-if-he-can-talk-her-into-it-before-it's-too-late.

Charlotte rolls her eyes and jokes, "Do I really have to explain the biology to you?"

"You know what I mean," Cooper tells her. He's smiling so hard, his cheeks are already starting to ache.

She shrugs a shoulder, like this is no big deal. Like it isn't the biggest deal ever. "Been tryin' for a while. I wanted to surprise you."

His jaw drops a little at that. "What?"

She loses just a little of her light, lifts her water glass halfway to her mouth and asks, "You gonna be pissed about it?" before taking her sip.

"No, no," he assures. "I'm about as far from pissed as possible right now; I just can't believe you pulled it off without me knowing."

Her response is casual, but there's something just underneath it, something uncomfortable: "I'm crafty. I can keep a secret when I need to."

And don't they both know that. For once, her penchant for keeping her mouth firmly shut, for keeping secrets and sneaking around, has paid off in a way that didn't lead to heartbreak or anger. So he smiles, and shakes his head, and tells her, "Looks like." Then he glances at Mason, and asks, "How come you got to find out before I did?"

Mason's grin is back, hundred-watt bright, and then he shrugs his shoulders and says plainly, "Because I'm her favorite."

A laughs pops out of Cooper before he can help it. "Ain't that the truth," he says, because it is, it certainly is. He wonders, not for the first time, how he got lucky enough to have a wife and a son who love the hell out of each other like these two do, despite their ever-so-slightly rocky beginning. In the end, he decides it's perfect - her telling Mason first, them telling him together. Involving the whole family.

He looks at Charlotte again, thinks of how much she must have planned all this out. Every little detail down to tonight. For him - because he knows it's for him. For them. He's in awe of her.

Her arms encircle Mason for a minute, pulling him off balance just a little, making him laugh. She looks at Cooper over Mason's head, and says, "It is. Plus, I'd never have wanted another kid if he wasn't such a good one. So. I figured he got first rights."

Mason looks at his dad and nods smugly - a perfect "that's right, I'm that cool," expression on his face, and Cooper didn't know it was possible to feel this level of gratitude, and joy, and... God, just _feelings_.

"Alright, alright," he dismisses playfully. "I'll let it slide this time."

"Good," Mason nods, settling back into his Momma.

And then she puts the kibosh on the whole thing, announcing, "But... favorite or not, it's past somebody's bedtime."

Mason's satisfied smile droops into a disappointed frown, and he groans, "Aw, man..."

"Hey." She lets him go, pokes him lightly in the shoulder. "I said you could stay up to tell your daddy, and now you have. But you're already almost an hour past your bedtime, and you have school in the morning. You're gonna be exhausted. Go, brush, bed."

She's all business now, and Mason sighs, and pushes his chair back. He can't quite hide the smirk tugging at his lips, though, even when he mutters a long-suffering, "Fine."

"Goodnight, buddy," Cooper tells him, tugging him into a quick bedtime hug and whispering, "I'm really glad you got to tell me."

"Me too," Mason whispers back, and then he gives Charlotte a little wave and heads out of the kitchen, toward the upstairs bedrooms.

Cooper watches him go, then turns back to Charlotte. She's still smiling, one fingertip on the edge of the sheet of paper between them, tilting it toward her and reading it over again. But with Mason gone, with most of the excitement over, she looks a little depleted. And then he thinks of how tired she's been, and suddenly it all makes sense. She's been pregnant. Here he was thinking she was stuck on what they'd lived through two years ago, and she was busy making new life. Moving on.

"Hey." He taps the chair Mason just vacated. "C'mere, you."

She smiles, then smirks, then chuckles and tells him, "I'm pregnant; you move."

His answering laugh is immediate, and appreciative, and he slides over into the empty chair and draws her into another hug. This one is gentler, less crushing, and she rests her forehead on his shoulder and sighs softly.

"I can't believe you did this," he whispers, pressing a kiss into her shoulder.

"Mm. We did this," she corrects, and he shakes his head, then separates them just enough for him to see her face.

"No, I just did what I always do. You made it into a baby."

One corner of her mouth curves back up, and she lifts an eyebrow for a brief moment. "I guess that's true."

He brushes her hair back, tucks it behind her ears, studies her face, the tired shadows under her eyes.

"How are you feeling?" he asks her.

"I'm alright," she says softly, and in a way that doesn't quite sell it. "Really tired. Threw up this afternoon, been queasy off and on all night, but... I'm alright."

"Mm. Well." He leans in again, presses a kiss to her brow. "We'd better head to bed, too, then. Gotta let you and our baby get your rest."

She smiles, and nods, tells him, "I suppose we do," and lets him lead her upstairs. When he stops her inside their bedroom and tugs her sweats down just enough to settle his hand low on her belly and shake his head in wonder, she rolls her eyes, but doesn't say anything about it. Lets him have his moment. She doesn't even give him crap for the stupid grins he keeps shooting her while she does simple things like brush her teeth, and wash her face, and toss her half-empty birth control packet into the trash.

When they crawl into bed, he lays close, kisses her goodnight, tells her how much he loves her and how grateful he is that she's doing this, and how he knows she won't regret it. She's asleep within minutes of hitting the mattress, but for Cooper, it takes longer. He's like a kid on Christmas, up all night, too excited to sleep.

He can't stop thinking of how amazing the rest of their lives are going to be.


	4. Chapter 4

The next morning, Cooper makes it all the way to the practice before he succumbs to the urge to tell his best friend. While he whisks Violet away to share the big news, Charlotte heads for the kitchen. It's empty, save for the one person she's looking for: Jake.

"So," she tells him in greeting, setting her purse on the island, easing herself into one of the kitchen chairs and smiling wryly at him. "You were right."

"I usually am," he tells her, smirking as he finishes filling his mug of coffee, then adding, "But what are we talking about this time?"

Charlotte glances around to make sure they still have privacy and says, "I'm pregnant."

Jake chuckles, and nods, and grins at her. "Well, congratulations. I'm sure Cooper's thrilled."

"Oh, he's over the damned moon," she confirms with a smile as Jakes leans against the island and sips. "He's off tellin' Violet right now."

"Safe to assume you're not keeping it a secret, then?"

Charlotte shrugs. "Not really, I suppose. I come from a long line of don't-spill-it-during-the-first-trimester types, but Cooper's gonna have a hell of a time keepin' his excitement to himself, and I'd rather my coworkers not think I've suddenly developed narcolepsy when I can't keep my eyes open during a meetin'." Jake smirks again, and Charlotte brushes someone's leftover toast crumbs into a pile in front of her, and then tells him what she came here to tell him: "But I wanted to tell you first, because - well, because you're the reason I figured it out in the first place, and also because I would like you to be my doctor."

"Really?" It's more of a statement of surprise than a question - this is clearly not a request he was expecting.

"Really," she confirms.

"Well, then I will be your doctor. I'm honored."

Pleased, Charlotte nods her satisfaction, then tells him, "You were great with Amelia - discrete, and respectful of her privacy, and Lord knows that's a trait in short supply in this office. I know total discretion is a pipe dream when it comes to my husband and babies, but I'd like to have at least some control over how much everybody knows about my business."

He chuckles again and moves to sit next to her, vowing, "I will be as discrete as possible."

"I appreciate it."

"Do you know how far along you are?"

The office kitchen isn't exactly an ideal place for an initial consult, but Charlotte figures they're still in casual conversation territory, so she lets it slide and does some mental math for him. "Last period started... six weeks ago, maybe a few days less. I marked it down in my planner, I can check."

"Later," he assures, waving a hand dismissively. "How are you feeling?"

Charlotte lifts her brows and admits, "Guilty about all the caffeine I've been suckin' down the last few weeks."

"People conceive on worse," Jake assures, "I'm sure the baby will be no worse for wear."

She nods, slowly. She knows that, too, but she still feels stupid for not catching on to the whole pregnancy thing sooner, and for loading up on so much coffee when she was trying to conceive. Just her luck for taking a month "off," huh?

"Yeah, I know. Still." He lifts his mug for another sip, and she glances longingly at it, then takes a deep breath to pull in the rich, delicious scent of coffee - she's gonna have to get used to slogging through the day without it for a while. Dangit. "Mostly, I'm just tired. Little queasy now and then, but not too bad."

"Lucky girl," he tells her. "You're far enough along for an early ultrasound, if you want it."

Charlotte's mouth curves into a grin. "Whether I want it is irrelevant. If he hadn't seen Violet right away, I'm pretty sure Coop would've dragged me to you or Addison - whoever was closer - and demanded one five minutes ago."

Jake's laugh is somewhere between amusement and pity, and he says, "So, when you say over the moon-"

"Jake, I'm surprised there wasn't skywriting. I can't remember the last time I saw him so happy."

"We should compare schedules - see if I can work you in sometime today."

"I'd appreciate it. I'm pretty booked this mornin', but maybe after lunch? Or tonight, if you don't mind stayin' a little late?"

"For my new favorite patient?" he jokes, sliding from his chair and giving her shoulder a squeeze. "Whatever you need."

"You're gonna regret callin' me that," she teases as he heads for the lobby, and she eases herself from her chair and skirts the coffee pot in which she'd so desperately like to indulge. Instead, she heads for the fridge and a cold bottle of water.

They plan the ultrasound for their lunch hour, but Charlotte's so tired by midday that she begs off for a nap. Cooper seems torn between wanting to whine over it or dote on her, but in the end he's convinced that some shut-eye is better for her in the long run. They manage to squeeze in the ultrasound between one of Jake's 2:00 appointment and Cooper having to leave to pick Mason up from school.

They're rushed, and for today, that's fine. They're only doing the ultrasound - Jake and Charlotte have already scheduled her first trimester tests for a day when they have more time. There's not much to see - just a little blobby embryo, but it's still pretty fantastic. Cooper gets all misty-eyed over it, and can't wipe the grin off his face. Charlotte's grinning too, trying to wrap her head around the surreal fact that the little nugget on the screen is actually in her belly right now. Jake measures the embryo to confirm - she's just shy of 6 weeks, like they suspected - and makes sure they have several grainy scans in hand when they finish.

Cooper clutches his like a prize, and heads off to pick up Mason and show him his little brother or sister.

Charlotte heads back to her desk, and props hers against the framed photo of the three of them - their family - next to her laptop.

Six weeks down, she thinks to herself. Thirty-four more to go.


	5. Chapter 5

They were out of toilet paper.

Or, almost out anyway. They'd been down to their last roll, so while Charlotte "oversaw homework time" - a nice term for what is really napping lightly on Mason's bed while he studies at his desk, waking up if he needs help with something - Cooper went on a Target run.

When he comes back, he has more than toilet paper.

He hides it at first, or at the very least, doesn't flaunt it immediately. It's not until after homework time is finished, and bedtime snacks are eaten, and Mason is minty fresh and tucked in bed that Charlotte makes the discovery. She walks into her bedroom and there's three more Target shopping bags on the bed, spilling with pastel, and plastic, and Avent and Gerber. She scoffs in amused disbelief and steps closer, tugging at one plastic handle to get a better look.

He went baby shopping. He's known she's pregnant for two weeks now, and he's already gone baby shopping. She's torn between bewilderment and wondering how it took him a whole two weeks to break and start buyin' stuff.

Cooper appears, suddenly, attempting to look casual as he rushes into the bedroom like he's just realized there's something he might not want her to see. "Hey..." he greets with a guilty smile.

She looks up at him, smiling, shaking her head. "What in the world?"

That guilty smile becomes a guilty grimace and he lifts one arm to scratch the back of his head before admitting, "I passed the baby section. Couldn't resist."

Charlotte eyes him suspiciously. "The baby section's nowhere near the toilet paper."

"Okay..." he draws out, stepping close and sitting on the edge of the bed. "I might've, y'know... aimed for it."

Charlotte snorts a little laugh and sits with him, upending the bags and spilling their contents into a pile on the bed. There's a pack of plain white onesies, and another set of three adorned with monkeys. A starfish bath towel with a matching washcloth. Baby socks - another three-pack: yellow, bananas, more monkeys. A couple of swaddling blankets.

"Cooper," she chides, no heat, all affection. "You bought baby clothes? We don't even know what we're havin' yet."

"They're unisex," he insists, grabbing the fancier three-pack and holding it up in front of himself, giving a little wiggle so the monkeys swing back and forth. "See? Monkeys. Everybody loves monkeys."

Charlotte shakes her head again, but she still can't wipe that smile off her face. She reaches over and pulls some more stuff from the pile. Bibs. More socks. A two-pack of Avent bottles, a three-pack of pacifiers. A monkey-shaped teether. A pack of muticolor baby feeding spoons that they'll have absolutely not use for until several months after the kid is born.

"We're not even through the first trimester yet," she reminds him. Hell, they've only just told their immediate friends and family, and already he's buying out the infants section. She doesn't want to admit it, but she finds it incredibly charming. His enthusiasm for this whole thing is infectious.

"So? Now we don't have to buy as much stuff later," he reasons, reaching for a tiny pair of crib shoes and holding them up. "And I mean, c'mon. How could I not buy these?"

"It's bad luck," she points out, and his face falls, goes surly and serious.

"Don't talk like that," he tells her. "You'll jinx us or something."

"I'm not the one buyin' out the store for a kid who's still the size of a blueberry."

Cooper sighs, drops the shoes back on the bed and asks, "Do you want to have another baby after this one, or is this it for us?"

The tone of this conversation has shifted, gone from light and playful to something more disappointing, and Charlotte sort of regrets steering them down this path. But she wants to be honest with him, so she tells him, "This is it. I'm gettin' too old to risk it again in a few years."

Cooper nods, like he was expecting that, and tells her, "I figured. So. I'm gonna go nuts for the next few months, and you..." He reaches up, taps the tip of her nose, and she smirks at him. "Are gonna let me. Because I only get to do this once with you, and I missed out on it with my first kid."

He has a point there, she figures, so she nods, and relents, telling him, "Fine. But don't go decoratin' the nursery without me."

His chuckle in response shifts quickly to a frown. "Oh. Nursery. We don't have a nursery."

Now Charlotte's the one chuckling, and asking, "You really think we each need our own home office?" in a way that makes it very clear she doesn't.

Cooper's frown deepens, then smooths out, and he gives her that look he gives her every time he realizes another way in which she planned this whole thing. "You were already trying before we moved in here?" he asks her, disbelieving, and she smiles and shrugs.

"I was thinkin' about it. Made sure we bought a house with enough space for one more, if we decided to go that route."

He shakes his head and reaches for her, tugging her in close and wrapping his arm around her. "I love you for doing this. And I'll get my stuff out of that office by the end of the week."

Charlotte chuckles, and shakes her head, leaning back up. "Nah. My office. It's closer to the bedroom."

"Alright. Your office it is."

"And there's no rush," she insists. "We have all sorts of time. Let's wait a few weeks before we start movin' furniture."

His whining sigh is so reminiscent of Mason's when he doesn't get his way that Charlotte can't help but smirk at him. "I really have to wait?"

"You really do," she tells him, sympathetically, before reaching for the onesies again and holding them up to her belly. "Do us a favor and give the monkey some time to grow into its room, alright?"

Cooper grins, then, and tugs the baby clothes from her grip, tossing them back with the rest of the stuff he'd bought. "Fine. If I can see your belly."

Charlotte rolls her eyes, and laughs, but scoots back on the bed nonetheless, stretching out on her back. "You know I'm not gonna be showin' for a few more weeks."

"Don't care," he insists, laying down next to her and tugging her shirt up, unbuttoning her slacks, and drawing her fly down. He scoots down until he's eye-level with her hips, props his head up on one elbow and skims his fingers over her belly. "My kid is in there, and this is the closest I get to be for months. I'll take what I can get."

"Alright," she smirks, shutting her eyes and figuring she'll rest a minute while he gets his fill of staring at her flat tummy. It's a risky move, condering her pervasive exhaustion lately, and sure enough, she's fast asleep in minutes.


	6. Chapter 6

_**Author's Note: **__I don't delete reviews, unless they're really offensive (and I'm not the least bit offended by people thinking my writing is boring or not liking its style). Anonymous reviews pend for 36 hours before they post to FFnet, so if you leave an anonymous review and you don't see it, it hasn't been deleted, it just hasn't finished pending. If you want your review to show up immediately, you need to be signed in._

_On to the story..._

* * *

The first trimester knocks her on her ass, and she spends much of the first few weeks she knows she's pregnant either asleep or trying desperately not to be. She naps over lunch - and starts having to give herself a full hour cushion to account for the amount of times she's has to punch the snooze on her phone alarm before she can manage to stay awake. She leaves the office at something resembling a decent hour, and if she makes it twenty minutes past dinner before heading to bed, she considers herself lucky.

During her ninth week, she's in the ER when another mother-to-be is admitted - 26 weeks and hyperemetic. She's been throwing up for months and is dehydrated and undernourished. Charlotte reminds herself to be glad the nausea's been bearable - she can go several days a time without a spell bad enough to actually have her prostrate before the porcelain throne.

What's really been challenging are the headaches. Tonight, it's a migraine beating against the back of her eyeball, squeezing her skull like a vise. The migraines pack a double-whammy - they make her miserable and they freak Mason out. Erica had suffered frequent headaches, and no matter how many times they tell him it's a rush of hormones making her quarantine herself in the bedroom, instituting a house-wide quiet time while Momma rests, they always make him uneasy.

And they couldn't have come at a worse time. The one year anniversary of Erica's death has just passed, and it's left Mason sullen and silent, more often than not. They'd known they would need to be prepared for him to process in whatever way he needed, but it's still been a challenge. Particularly when the fresh well of grief had manifested itself as a sudden about-face in how he felt about the baby. At first, he'd been excited - or at least positive - but one day he'd turned to her, frowning, and asked if she was sure she really wanted to have another baby. Because wouldn't it be nice if it was just them? Ever since, he's been tepid at best about the prospect of becoming a big brother, and downright negative about it every time the side effects of early pregnancy take Charlotte down for the count.

Cooper says he hovers, that he always wants to be upstairs in his room, as close to her as he can manage without disturbing her. Just in case. Tonight, he creeps into the bedroom with her. She can't see him, with the shades drawn tight and a chilled eye-mask to help ease the pain. But she hears the tiny squeak of the door hinge, and his quiet "ow!" when he trips over the end of the bed a minute later.

She doesn't say anything, and neither does he, but she can damn near feel the tension coming off him as he stands there. She breaks the silence, breathing, "Everything okay, Mase?"

He whispers back, a little loudly for comfort, "Just checking on you."

It warms her heart, but she's still too pained to smile, so she tells him, "I'll be alright. If you're really quiet and still, you can lay with me for a while."

He doesn't answer, keeping quiet as she asked, but she hears the shuffle of his feet across the carpet and then the bed dips with his weight. She swallows against a roll of nausea, but then he settles, links their fingers in the dark, and goes still.

That's how Cooper finds them hours later, fast asleep.


	7. Chapter 7

They're sitting up in bed, both of them reading, Charlotte with an extra pillow behind her back in an attempt to quell the heartburn thats been plaguing her all night. They make an odd tableau, she thinks. She is on her iPad, reading the latest issue of _Southern Living_; Cooper is avidly devouring What to Expect When You're Expecting. It should be the other way around, she thinks - the momma-to-be reading the baby book, the daddy engrossed in his tech gadgets. But when have they ever been normal?

"This is the last week of your first trimester," he tells her, and Charlotte answers with, "I know." And, God, she's grateful. She's finally gotten some of her energy back (a welcome development), and her pants are all starting to feel too tight (less welcome, that). She's not showing yet, not really, despite, as Cooper is currently informing her, "Your uterus is now the size of a grapefruit." She just feels...thick. Truth be told, she's startin' to look forward to the appearance of an actual bump. It'd be better than the way she sees herself now - bloated and like she's packed on a few pounds. And it's not like she's self-conscious or anything like that, but as someone who works hard to stay in good shape, she doesn't really appreciate the baby makin' it look like she's started to let herself go.

"You should be feeling fatigue, lack of energy, sleepiness, frequent urination, nausea - with or without vomiting - excess saliva, constipation, heartburn, indigestion, flatulence, bloating-"

She cuts him off there, telling him as kindly as she can manage, "Trust me, Coop, you don't have to tell me I'm dealin' with constipation, flatulence, and heartburn." She swipes the page on her magazine and mutters, "I am well aware."

Cooper coos a sympathetic _awww_ from beside her and sets the book down, spine up, on the bed between them. He scoots a little closer, and presses a hand to her belly. "Does someone have the toots?" he teases, and she rolls her eyes and glares at him.

Lowering her voice for modesty, despite the fact it's just the two of them, she hisses, "It's not funny. You try sittin' through a board meeting with a gut full of gas, desperately tryin' not to let one fly. It's painful."

"You shouldn't hold them in, Char, it's bad for you," he chides, and she make a face at him. She doesn't appreciate when he doctors her.

"I know that, Coop, but don't you think it'd be a little unprofessional for me to perfume the room during a budget discussion?"

"Might liven things up a bit," he teases, and she means to roll her eyes at him again, but she finds herself smirking instead. When she doesn't have anything more to say for him, Cooper massages her belly gently, and says, "You need to eat more fiber. That's what the book says," and Charlotte feels herself growing irritated again.

"I know what the book says, Cooper, I read the whole thing before I even tested positive. And in case it slipped your notice, I'm a doctor. I don't need a book to tell me how to relieve constipation and gas."

Cooper scowls at her. "No way. There's no way you read all of What to Expect When You're Expecting without me noticing. If for no other reason than I had to spend, like, a week and a half digging through my stuff to find it when you told me you were pregnant."

Charlotte looks at him, then back at her iPad, tapping the edge of it pointedly, and stage-whispering, "E-book."

Cooper flops back on the bed with a frustrated sigh, then tells her, "Y'know, all this planning and forethought you did is great but it takes a lot of the fun out of this."

"I don't like to go in unprepared," she reminds him. "You know that. Besides, you read the whole thing when Violet was pregnant; it's not like we're discoverin' the miracle of pregnancy together for the first time."

He reaches over, hooks a finger over her iPad and tugs it down, forcing her to give him her full attention. "Hey." He gives her something between guilty frown and confused scowl, and asks, "Are you still mad about that? I mean, does it bug you?"

Charlotte shrugs, and dismisses, "It was years ago. I'm over it. I'm just sayin' you don't really have a license to scold me for readin' ahead."

He sighs again, mutters, "Fine," and Charlotte finds herself actually feeling a little bit bad for him. He's stuck on the outside, and he's tryin' to be involved in a way that's more fun than holdin' her hair back while she horks up last night's dinner or passing her Tums when her chest is burning. So she takes pity on him, and says, "Y'know, it's been a while since I read the book..." Cooper looks up at her, and she adds, "I could probably do with a refresher course."

Recognizing the gesture for what it is, he smiles and reaches for the book again. Charlotte puts her iPad to sleep and sets it aside, and they rearrange themselves so she's leaning against his shoulder, close enough to follow along as he reads aloud to her. He tells her all about her emotional state, and her next checkup, and getting enough fiber and drinking plenty of water, headaches, and sex, and how to deal with working while pregnant. It's nothing she doesn't already know, but she lets herself share it with him this time, and it sounds much less like a textbook read. They read all the way through to the end of week thirteen before she's stifling her yawns.

Cooper shuts the book and tells her it's time they turn in and let the little monkey get some rest. While she's brushing her teeth, Cooper steps up behind her and cups a hand low on her belly.

"Only six more months," he whispers excitedly, pressing a kiss to her shoulder and meeting her gaze in the mirror.

Charlotte smiles around her toothbrush, and tells herself that six more months of discomfort is a small price to pay for the all the joy they're gonna have when this kid finally moseys its way into their lives.


	8. Chapter 8

The second trimester brings an added bonus of sex. Lots of sex. Lots and lots of really, really good sex. Charlotte's ready to go pretty much anytime anywhere, and Cooper couldn't be happier.

Tonight, they're in their own bed - a rare occasion these days. More often than not, they get busy in his office. Or hers. Or her other office. The bathroom sink. The bathroom floor... Earlier tonight, it was the kitchen table. Mason is at a sleepover, so they're free to do it wherever they want, however they want.

But eventually they'd ended up here, sprawled across the bed, with the convenient luxury of pillows to help with positioning and support. It had been fantastic - she's on fire tonight, and Cooper had been more than happy to let her take control and simply be carried along for the ride.

Now they're a tangled mess of limbs, her leg woven with his, his arm caught under her, hers across his belly. They're both sweaty and, to be honest, a little smelly, but they're also both too noodley to mind.

Cooper is grinning at her - he can't help it. She's finally starting to look pregnant - her breasts have changed, and her belly has popped. She has the slightest of baby bumps, and he finds it inexplicably sexy. That reminder that he's gotten her pregnant, she's all his. All that luscious, suddenly curvy body is his to enjoy. In fact, he's thinking he might enjoy it another time, just as soon as he can feel his toes properly again.

She's smiling back at him, and then suddenly she isn't, her mouth pulling into a grimace, one hand dropping to her belly. Cooper feels a hit of nervous adrenaline, and asks, "You okay?"

"Yeah," she grunts, before relaxing, her brow smoothing out, face going placid again. "Just crampy."

"Oh. That's not good - should we be worried?"

She goes from placid to that amused annoyance she's so good at displaying, and tells him, "Cooper. Cramps after sex are perfectly normal. You know that."

And he does, it's true, he's read it (more than once) in the books, but that doesn't make it any less unnerving to see his pregnant wife frowning over her belly. "Maybe we should take it easy for the rest of the night."

"If by 'take it easy' you mean 'take me without hesitation,' I wholeheartedly agree," she smirks, nudging him with her toe.

But Cooper's still a little too unnerved to want to go there again just yet, so he tells her, "I mean it. I think we should give the kid a break, before it has a permanent soft spot."

It's impossible, they both know that, but Charlotte still humors him with a chuckle and relents. "Fine." A beat later, she adds, "I'm starvin'. Let's order somethin' in."

Cooper reaches over, rubs a hand over her belly. "And what does your pregnant heart desire?"

"Mmm," she muses, considering her options. "Don't know about my heart, but my hungry fetus wants pizza. With all the toppings - and extra cheese."

It's a rare indulgence for a woman who's tried hard to keep up a healthy diet while cooking their kid, and Cooper is more than happy to go along with it.

He gropes for his phone, and ten minutes later, they have pizza on the way.


	9. Chapter 9

Jake finds Charlotte in the kitchen, going over a chart and eating a cup of black cherry yogurt.

"Hey there," he greets, and she looks up and smiles. "How's my favorite patient?"

Her smile fades, and she rolls her eyes. "Congested," she tells him, and he can hear it in her voice. "It's like allergy season on steroids."

"Yeah, that can happen," he says, sympathetically, grabbing a banana off the countertop and beginning to peel it. "Do I have to tell you to take more vitamin C?"

"If I take any more C, I'll turn into a damned orange," she mutters, and then she sniffles slightly, and huffs a sigh, reaching across the countertop and grabbing a napkin. She mutters, "This is ridiculous," and then blows her nose. She's not careful, though, and it's a pretty forceful blow. It may clear her nasal passages, but when she wipes her nose a final time and pitches the napkin into the trash, there's a faint smear of red under her nose, and a nearly immediate slow trickle of blood. "I mean, I get the point of it - I get that it's my body tryin' to keep me healthy while it's vulnerable, but it's annoyin' as hell."

"You may want to grab another napkin," he advises before biting into his banana. Charlotte lifts a hand to her nose, makes a frustrated face and pulls it away. There's blood on her hand.

"Oh, for God's sake," she grumbles, reaching for another napkin and pressing it to her nose to absorb the blood.

"Lean forward and-"

"I know," she insists, already in the process of easing her weight forward slightly, and shifting her grip on the tissue until she's pinching just below the bridge of her nose. "I know basic first aid, Jake." She sounds irritated, her plugged nose making her nasally and stunting her vowels.

"Just trying to help," he reminds, and she sighs, nods slightly.

"Yeah. Sorry." She turns her attention back to the chart in front of her. "Been meaning to talk to you, actually. I need to move our next appointment. I have a couple who're impossible to schedule, and - surprise, surprise - that's the only time they're both available in the next month."

"Okay, no problem." He takes another bite, chews. She keeps up her charting. When he's swallowed, he asks, "Are you guys going to want to know the sex?"

"Definitely," she murmurs, scribbling a few more lines, then shutting the folder and setting her pen on top of it. "I don't like surprises."

He smirks. That sounds about right for Charlotte. "Well, hopefully the baby will be accommodating, then."

"Our kid?" Charlotte asks with a quirk of her brow. "Doubtful."

He chuckles at that. "Are you implying that you're stubborn and don't like making things easier on other people?"

Charlotte looks up at him. "I do everything you tell me to, don't I?"

"You do," he agrees. "I wasn't accusing, I was asking."

It's hard to see her smirk around the hand in front of her face, but he can tell from her eyes.

"And I wasn't just talking about you."

That smirk becomes a grin - easier to see, that - and she chuckles. "Oh, well in that case..." she says jokingly, before she eases the napkin from her nose gingerly, folds it, presses a clean side against her nose gently and checks it. It comes away clean.

"All better?"

"Looks like," she confirms, wiping again softly and then tossing the napkin in the trash to join its earlier companion. "Now let's just hope that's the only one today."

"Are the nosebleeds happening often?"

"Often enough to be annoying," she says, swirling her spoon through her yogurt, and then scooping up a bite. Before taking it, she adds, "But not often enough to worry about."

"Alright." He glances at his watch and before taking another big bite of his banana, he says, "I have to go prep for my next appointment, but we'll work out a new time for yours."

"Sounds good," she tells him, and then he's heading out of the kitchen, giving her shoulder an affectionate squeeze as he passes.


	10. Chapter 10

Cooper has been on the phone for twenty-five minutes, and the last twenty of them have been an exercise in torture.

"You need to make sure you're considering his feelings, too, you know. Not just hers," his mother tells him tartly, and Cooper drops his head back with a sigh and slumps down further on the couch in his office. It's the end of the day, and he figured he'd cap it off with a phone call to his parents - a decision he's now thoroughly regretting.

"I know, mom," he tells her. "We are. Mason's been coming around a little. I think he's gonna be okay with all this."

"Two weeks ago you were worried he'd never adjust," she reminds, and he doesn't need the mention to recall the weeks of anxiety they've lived through. When they first found out, Cooper had been thrilled at how excited Mason seemed to be, and then - bam. Shut down. But lately, it hasn't been so bad...

"Well, that was two weeks ago. A lot can change in two weeks of a pregnancy. Speaking of..." Maybe he shouldn't go here, but his mother's tone about this whole thing is just rubbing him the wrong way, and he can't resist. "Charlotte's fine, too, by the way," he mutters, pointedly. "She's doing great, aside from the migraines, but even those are better. And the baby is good - strong heartbeat, growing like a weed."

"Cooper," his mother chides - clearly she doesn't appreciate his tone, but he's frustrated. It's been twenty minutes of her fretting over how this pregnancy is going to affect Mason, and Cooper, but without a lick of excitement about the baby or a drop of concern for Charlotte.

"She's my wife, mom."

"I'm well aware." And none too pleased, as she never misses an opportunity to let him know. Her voice is dripping with it tonight - a mix of contempt, irritation, disappointment. "But she's a grown-up, and the symptoms of her pregnancy are quite frankly none of my concern."

"Our pregnancy!" he blurts. "It's my baby, too. It's not just hers, it's mine, and you'd think you could show just a ilttle bit of excitement over the fact that I'm having another child, that you're getting a new grandkid, but no." He props his feet on the coffee table in front of him, shuts his eyes and squeezes the bridge of his nose lightly. "Do you really hate Charlotte so much that you can't even be happy for us?"

"We are happy for you-"

"No, you're not."

"It's just that now you're tied to her, Cooper. Forever. There's no untangling yourself from that woman once you have a child together."

His head hurts. Literally, there's a throbbing ache starting up over his temples, a physical manifestation of the frustration, and hurt, and anger that he feels every time this conversation rolls around.

"I'm married to her, mom," he reminds, again. "We're already tied together."

"Half of all couples these days get divorced," his mother dismisses. "Marriage doesn't have to be permanent - just ask Charlotte."

"Well, thanks for the vote of confidence," he mutters grimly, entirely unappreciative of that particular barb.

"But a baby-"

"It's done!" he cuts her off, because this is a useless argument to be having. "She's already pregnant, mom. You can hate it all you want, but the baby has already happened, so just... God, just let it go. And like you said, we're all stuck together forever, so just... Just give her another chance."

"You've already given her enough for all of us," his mother counters, and Cooper has the overwhelming urge to throw things, but he keeps it in check.

"Yeah," he sighs. "I have. And she's amazing. And our marriage is amazing, and our family is amazing. So if you guys want to act like this, then... God, fine. Whatever. You can be mad about the whole thing, but all it's going to do is put distance between you, and her, and me, and your grandchildren." He's exhausted now, and he needs to head home, so he tells her, "I have to go."

"Cooper-"

"No, mom, I have to get home to my wife and my son. Bye."

He hangs up on her - a rare occurrence in their relationship, but he's so angry right now, he doesn't even know what to do with himself. He forces himself to count down from ten to try to quell his ire - and when that doesn't work, he adds ten more, and then another ten, and finally he's calmed down enough to head home.

When he gets there, Charlotte is in the kitchen, making mac and cheese while Mason tells her all about the book he's supposed to be reading this summer. Cooper puts his conversation with his mother out of his mind, and joins them. His parents can approve or not, it makes no difference tonight.


	11. Chapter 11

The monkey thing has stuck. She's not quite sure how it happened, but it certianly has. She thinks she can blame Cooper for it. Despite her protests, he kept bringing home monkeys. Little stuffed monkeys, monkey rattles, a monkey baby bouncer. She doesn't seem to able to stop him, and she's starting to resign herself to the fate of their future kid.

Whatever it is, boy or girl, it's gonna be the monkey.

Half the time, that's all Mason will call it. He's come around again, with another several weeks of pregnancy behind them and some good advice from Violet. Charlotte's bump has grown, and the inevitable reality of his impending big brotherhood is unavoidable, and fascinating. He asks questions now - how big is the baby? Can it hear me? Is it moving around in there? After it's born, how old will it have to get before it'll be fun to play with?

A week ago, they were in the car when she felt a fluttering in her belly. She'd pressed against it absently, stopped at a red light, silently cursing her pregnant digestive system. The last thing she needed today was more gas bubbles. And then it had happened again, and she'd frowned, and thought to herself that this didn't feel quite like gas, and, wait, maybe this was more. Maybe this was...

Mason had caught her expression, and asked what was wrong, and she'd murmured, "I think... I think the monkey's movin'," despite all her previous insistence that the kid not be called a primate all the damned time.

"Really?" he'd asked, brightening a little and reaching a hand over, then pausing a few inches away from her. "Can I feel?"

She'd made an apologetic face and told him, "It's too early for you to feel it."

"Oh," he'd deflated. "Well, when can I?"

"Few more weeks," she'd told him when the light turned green. "When the baby's a little bigger."

He'd smirked, and looked at her, then leaned over and spoke loudly at her belly, "Grow up, monkey! I want to feel you move."

Charlotte had just laughed at him, shaking her head in amusement. "Sit back in your seat, please, mister."

Mason had obliged and then asked her, "Do you think the monkey's a girl or a boy?"

"Well, I think it's a human, not a monkey," Charlotte had begun, before adding, "And I think it's a girl."

"It's still the monkey," he'd argued, breezing past the topic to, "How do you know it's a girl?"

Charlotte shrugged a shoulder. She couldn't really say, to be honest. "I don't know. I guess I don't. I guess I just hope it's a girl."

"Why?"

"Because I already have a boy," she'd told him, "And he's wonderful. If we have another boy, then he'll have to live up to his big brother, and I'm not sure we want to put the poor kid through that, do we?"

Mason had just smirked, and crossed his arms and told her, "It's okay. If it's a boy, I'll just teach him how to be cool."

He'd said it with his usual swagger and confidence, and Charlotte had nodded and said "Alright, then," and pulled up to the curb outside his school.

He'd climbed out of the car and waved goodbye, and she'd let herself sit there for a few minutes, forcing herself to relax, willing the baby inside her to move again. After a few minutes of nothing, she'd murmured quietly, "Come on, monkey..."

She knows better than to think the baby can hear and understand her, but she'll be damned if it didn't move as if on command. Another little flutter that made her heart beat a little bit harder.

"Okay," she'd told it. "I guess if you wanna be the monkey, then the monkey you'll be."

And ever since, she's been on board. It's been monkey-this and monkey-that. All sorts of monkeys.

They've talked about painting the nursery a soft yellow, because it's neutral, but Charlotte has a suspicion that it's to match the slew of monkeys and bananas they already own. She wants to fill it with pastels and lace and pretty, little-girl things. A sunshiney room for a daughter to discover the world in. She thinks maybe she can still manage to do that and incorporate the monkeys, but with every new item Cooper brings into the house, that thought looks more and more like a pipe dream.

If she doesn't put her foot down soon, their kid's gonna grow up in a room full of jungle trees, not a bit of class or style in sight.


	12. Chapter 12

His mouth has been on fire for weeks. All Charlotte seems to want these days is spicy - and the spicier the better. Mexican, Indian, Thai, you name it. It's baby en fuego in their home, and Cooper and Mason are paying the price.

Not that Charlotte isn't. She orders everything extra hot, and her pregnant body makes her suffer for it. Heartburn, indigestion, you name it, she's got it. She carries TUMS in her pocket, and chomps them after every blisteringly hot meal, but she can't seem to tear herself away from the fire.

"Y'know, you could get the korma medium instead of tongue-meltingly-hot and save yourself some future heartbreak," he warns her as she dictates her Indian take-out order. All it gets him is a scowl.

"The real heartbreak is settlin' for somethin' less than delicious," she insists, and he wants to remind her that medium was her standard for years, but it's not worth arguing with a pregnant woman, so he relents.

"Indian _again_?" Mason complains with a sigh, when the smell of dinner arriving (and Charlotte's graceless holler up the stairs) beckons him from his summer homework.

"Your Momma wanted spicy," Cooper explains needlessly, and Mason rolls his eyes.

"That's all she ever wants," he grumbles.

Charlotte protests with an indignant, "Hey!" and then must see the truth in what he says, because she follows up with, "Tell you what - next week, you can choose dinner every night."

Mason brightens at that, reaching for his chicken tikka and questioning, "Really?"

"Really," she agrees, and Cooper actually goes so far as to write it on their calendar so she can't back out of it. She makes Mason swear not to have them eating macaroni every night, but otherwise she seems committed to the compromise.

An hour later, as Charlotte chews antacids and scowls over a stack of recent medical journals, Cooper and Mason sit down and plan a week's worth of meals that get no spicier than the pepperoni they'll have on their pizza Wednesday night.

If Charlotte misses the heat, she doesn't complain, and they go seven whole days without discomfort or flaming tongues.


	13. Chapter 13

The ultrasound is pristine. Not a defect to be found. Ten perfect fingers, ten perfect toes, and a penis they can't miss when the baby rolls and splays himself conveniently.

Cooper is over the moon; Charlotte smiles through the lump in her throat and pretends she's thrilled, too.

When they get home, she shuts herself in the bathroom, lets the tub run while she sits on the lowered toilet seat and cries, and hates herself for it. There are hormones at work here, and she knows that, but the knowledge doesn't make her feel any better. She reminds herself that the baby is healthy, that she should be grateful, that she has a son who's stolen her whole damned heart, so why wouldn't she want another to love just as much?

But that's just it. She already has her boy, and she'd wanted a matched set. The amazing son she'd never known she wanted and the daughter she'd been dreaming of. She thinks of skirts and frills, princess movies and prom dresses, makeup and first kisses. The pain of loss is palpable, eclipsed only by the hard hammer of guilt gaveling down on her at the very thought that she's crying over perfection.

That perfect isn't good enough, she'd wanted more.

She's a horrible mother. This was a mistake. If she can't even be selfless enough to accept her perfect baby in all his flawless glory, how can she manage to pull off the mommy business at all?

The tub fills and she has to crank down the faucet, which means she has to kill the waterworks too, or she'll be found out. So she reins herself in, and strips, sinking into the bath until the water hits her chin, and brooding there until it goes cold.

When she goes to check Mason's summer school homework a little bit later, he gives her a guilty look and admits he's not done yet. He's been too busy making a list of all the things he wants to teach his baby brother - so he doesn't forget anything when the baby comes.

Charlotte can't help it; she smiles at him. This kid, sometimes he just kills her. She has a traitorous thought that the boy in her belly can't possibly live up to the one sitting beside her, but she pushes it aside and asks him to read her the list.

He obliges:

_Pokemon_.

_Soccer._

_Fishing._

_Baseball._

_How to make a paper football._

_Bakugan._

_Phineas and Ferb._

_Fairly OddParents._

_Peanut-butter-peanut-butter jelly-jelly sandwiches._

_Lightsabers._

_Blanket forts._

_Pillow forts._

_Couch forts._

_How to make the water drop sound with his tongue._

_Armpit farts._

_How cool frogs are._

_The aquarium._

_Eels._

_How to swim in the pool._

_How to dunk someone._

_Cannonballs._

_Why Batman is awesome._

It goes on and on - she'd interrupted his writing at number 102. A litany of frogs, and snails, and puppy dog tails. A boy's list of boy things. He stops here, though, at number twenty-two, and looks at her. "I'm really glad the monkey's a boy. I couldn't do all this stuff with a girl," he tells her, before he starts back up again with, "Comic Books..."

She watches him read, and that vice around her heart starts to loosen, bit by bit. With every item on the list, she aches less and less for the kiddie jewelry, and the pastel nursery, and the long, silky hair to braid and curl. She watches her son tell her all the things he wants to share with his brother, and thinks maybe living in this boys' club is okay. The baby in her belly gives a little kick, and she smiles and settles her hand over her bump.

Yeah, she thinks.

This will be just fine. Better, even.

Ten perfect fingers, ten perfect toes.

Exactly as he's meant to be.


	14. Chapter 14

"Cooper?"

There's something poking at his shoulder, pulling him halfway out of sleep. Cooper grunts, but keeps his eyes glued firmly shut.

Again, three little pokes, and a stage-whispered, "Cooper?"

For a second, he thinks it's Mason - the voice is somewhere between guilty and mischievous, and low enough to be hard to pick out. But Mason would be calling him Dad, and he's waking up enough now to recognize the voice as Charlotte's.

With a groan, he peels his eyes open and manages a, "Wha?"

When she answers him, he's pretty sure he's still dreaming: "I want tacos." It's spoken like a guilty secret, but one she relishes all the same. But he has to have heard her wrong, because this is ridiculous.

"...What?"

"I want tacos," she repeats, still whispering, drawing out the last word dreamily.

"Are you serious?"

"Yes."

He lifts his head enough to see the clock on her nightstand, and says, "Char, it's two AM."

"I know..." she whispers, and he just looks at her, or what he can see of her in the dark, anyway. After a second she adds, "I really, really want tacos."

She's serious, muttering it like tacos are the frigging holy grail or something.

"Now?"

"Yeah..."

"I love you, but..." He's kicking himself already for what he's about to say, but, seriously? Two AM. "Go get some tacos then?"

He hears her scoff lightly, and feels her whap his arm. "You're the daddy-to-be. Midnight cravings are your job. Besides, someone's gotta stay here with Mason."

"I could do that."

"No, I need you to go get tacos," she tells him, plainly, still sotto voce. He's really thinking that maybe this is all a dream. He pinches himself hard - nope, he's wide awake. He can hear the charming smile in her voice when she asks, "Please?"

With a defeated groan, he rolls out of the bed, muttering, "They're just gonna give you heartburn."

"I promise I won't complain about it," she vows, sounding pleased as punch.

"You're damn right you won't," he grumbles, trying to force himself fully awake as he gropes under the bed for his sneakers. If he's making a midnight taco run, he's not bothering to get dressed. Pajama pants and a t-shirt are just fine if you ask him. "Where am I supposed to find you tacos at two AM?"

"You'll find them," she assures confidently. "Three tacos, with hot sauce, and sour cream, and - ooh - guacamole if they have it. And maybe some chips."

"Right. Got it." He doesn't, but if he's going for Mexican in the middle of the night, she'll take whatever he can find and be happy with it. He leaves the bedroom without so much as a goodbye, and pulls up Yelp on his phone. He thanks his lucky stars when it tells him Pinches Tacos is open until three.

Perfect.

And also horrible. Because it's two AM and he's awake and headed to his car.

Thankfully, there's almost no traffic in the middle of the night, so it doesn't take him too long to get there. He orders her tacos, and, against his better judgement, one for himself, and heads home.

He climbs the stairs, take-out container in hand, and pushes open the door to the bedroom. "Alright," he announces quietly. "I come bearing tacos."

There's no answer.

"Char?"

He sits on her side of the bed and feels for the bedside lamp, clicking it on. There's barely a twitch as the light hits her sleeping face.

_You've gotta be kidding_, he thinks, and now _he's_ the one poking _her_ in the shoulder.

She grunts, mumbles, "'M sleepin'..."

"I have your tacos," he tells her again, but all she does is turn her face into the pillow and slur something unintelligible.

Cooper stares at her, dumbfounded. He just spent the hour between two and three AM on a taco run, and now she's so asleep she can't be bothered?

Fuming silently, and reminding himself they're both at the whim of her hormones and the demanding baby in her belly, he gives up on her and marches himself down to the kitchen. He eats his own taco, then stashes hers in the fridge, and by the time he returns to bed, it's halfway to four.

When he wakes in the morning, she's in the shower, so he wakes Mason and then trudges down the stairs, eyes grainy with exhaustion.

When Charlotte finally emerges and joins their son at the kitchen table, Cooper is ready for her. Wordlessly, he walks to the table and deposits a plate in front of her.

She looks at the three tacos on the plate, then at him, guiltily. "I'll eat 'em for lunch," she assures, but Cooper shakes his head.

"Oh no," he tells her. "I did not go out in the middle of the night to buy your lunch. Eat up."

"Tacos for breakfast?"

"I think tacos for breakfast sounds cool," Mason pipes up, and Charlotte turns to smile at him.

"Oh, do you?" she questions, and he nods. Charlotte slides the plate closer to their son and says, "Then you can help me eat 'em."

Mason doesn't have to be told twice - he reaches over and grabs a taco, biting in eagerly.

Cooper sits down on Charlotte's other side and reaches for the plate. "I suppose I can give you a hand, too."

Lightning fast, she whaps his hand away and tugs the plate closer. "I'm fairly certain I was ordered to eat up," she says tartly, but then she smiles at him and it doesn't escape Cooper's notice that she's already halfway through her first taco. It looks like breakfast tacos are treating her better than she thought they would.

Cooper raises his brows and holds his hands up innocently.

"Well, alright then," he says with an air of approval, and they take a morning meal of tacos followed by Cheerios.

It's a little unorthodox, sure, but when have they ever been normal?


	15. Chapter 15

The summer is hot and miserable - and doubly so now that she's pregnant.

Temperatures soar into the 100s and settle there, and the pressure-cooker in her gut makes her feel even hotter. Charlotte spends the days in sleeveless blouses and classy maternity dresses, and the evenings in tank tops and tiny shorts. Or, even better, in the pool.

She's never been more happy that they moved than she is in the blazing heat of California summer, when she can end her workday by slipping into the cool water a mere fifteen feet from her kitchen. Until now, the biggest fan of the pool had been Mason, who considered it a serious social perk to be the kid who could throw the awesome pool parties. But lately, it's all Charlotte.

Cooper and Mason don't hesitate to join her - and why should they, with the days long, and the responsibilities of homework lighter in the summer months - but while they play tag, and volleyball, and compete mercilessly to dunk each other, Charlotte balances herself on a pair of foam noodles, or tucks her arms and shoulders up through an innertube and lets the water soothe her overheated body. She feels buoyant, floaty, cool and comfortable.

That is, until she gets beaned in the head with a stray beach ball, or body-checked by a ten-year-old who's one dunk behind his dad and not too keen on the depth perception.

"Sorry, Momma!" he calls, and she shuts her eyes again, tips her face back up to the dusky sky, and listens as her husband tells their son he has to be more careful.

"She's pregnant, you know, you can't just ram into her like that."

"I said I was sorry. It was an accident," Mason says, with enough guilt in his voice that Charlotte cracks her eyes back open to look at him.

"I'm fine," she assures, offering a smile. "Water makes a good buffer. But if one of ya wouldn't mind givin' my big butt a shove on over toward the deep end and outta the crossfire, I'd appreciate it."

Mason snickers at her as Cooper swims the few feet between them, and tells her, "Your butt is not big." He lowers his voice until just the two of them can hear, and adds, "Your butt is fantastic."

Charlotte grins, and waggles her brows at him. Over his shoulder, she catches sight of Mason sneakily paddling his way closer, eyes all full of mischief. He motions for her to be quiet, and she turns her gaze back to Cooper, murmuring lowly, "Oh, yeah? Maybe after bedtime, you can take a better look at it. Make sure your opinion still holds."

"It still holds," he assures her, and Mason is close enough for contact, but slips beneath the water instead. "But if you think I should get a second-AAH!"

Cooper contorts suddenly, and Mason pops up a foot away, sputtering water as he laughs. Charlotte cranes her neck down just in time to see her husband yanking his swim trunks back up, and cackles a laugh. He'd been good and well pantsed.

Cooper turns an accusatory glare on her and asks, "Did you know he was behind me?"

Charlotte's grin widens, and she nods, telling him matter of factly, "Sure did."

"Traitor!" he insists, with a laugh, giving her the earlier-requested shove toward deeper waters. "You're banished to the deep end for your crimes, woman!"

Charlotte chuckles to herself, and as she floats her way out of danger, turns her head in their direction to watch Cooper chase Mason around the pool in search of retribution.

It may be hot, and long, and exacerbating the discomforts of pregnancy, but tonight, summer isn't so bad.


	16. Chapter 16

She's the most beautiful thing he's ever seen.

He's always thought she was amazing, but, God, now that she's pregnant, he just can't take his eyes off her. He's dreamed of this, wished for it, hoped and hoped and hoped for it, but a tiny part of him wasn't sure if she'd ever do it. And now he's spent the last few months watching her get more and more pregnant, and it's been fantastic. He's watched her belly go from enviously flat, to a subtle little bump, to now - an unmistakeable rounded curve. She's never been hurting in the cleavage department, but she's gone up a whole cup size already, and between that and the belly, her maternity clothes now fit like a dream.

He's seen a lot of good-looking pregnant women working where he does, but Charlotte surpasses all of them. Before they climb into bed at night, he watches her check herself out in the long bathroom mirror, lifting her tank top, turning to the side, and frowning over her belly.

"You're not gonna like me much when I'm the size of a cow," she mutters, and he chokes a laugh around his toothbrush and shakes his head at her.

Spits, rinses, and says, "You're wrong. I'm gonna like you even more."

She rolls her eyes, mutters something about him being a freak, but she's smiling as she does it, and he knows the reassurance soothes her a little, as her body starts to grow further and further out of her control. She seems to believe him, which is good, because he's not sure how he'd go about convincing her if she questioned his sincerity.

How can he explain to her what this feels like? The little jolt of satisfied pleasure he gets every time he catches sight of her, every time she presses a hand to the curve of her belly in a vain attempt to settle a rambunctious kicking session, every time she mutters some low complaint about the latest irritating symptom of pregnancy. He loves every blessed second of it, and he can't offer her any better reason than that they're making a life together, and it's written all over her, and there's something ecstatic, and hopeful, and brilliant about the whole thing.

They're making a family together, and she's the one responsible for bringing this dream of his to fruition, and she is doing a hell of a job and looking great in the process. He's proud of her, he's floored by her, he's never been more in love with her.

He doesn't care if she gets stretch marks, or a waddle, or a belly the size of a large beach ball. He's going to spend the few months he has left of Pregnant Charlotte loving her with all the strength and fervor he can muster.


	17. Chapter 17

In August, they take Mason on his first trip to visit his grandparents in Ohio.

It's their last hurrah before he starts fifth grade, and Mason and Cooper are both excited - Cooper because he gets to show his son where he grew up (and give him some rare quality time with the extended family), and Mason because his grandparents have a habit of showering him with gifts every time they see him. And every holiday. And sometimes when he simply gets good grades or performs in a play they wish they could attend. Charlotte, on the other hand, is less enthused.

Things still haven't smoothed over between Cooper's parents and his wife, and she's predicting a week of awkward interaction and forced civility. His parents don't disappoint. Charlotte has made herself a promise - that she'll do her best to mend fences this week, to show her in-laws that she's worthy of a second chance. Without, y'know, groveling, sacrificing herself in any way, or actually bringing up the elephant in the room.

She hangs back, letting the Freedmans set the agenda for the week, and blithely agreeing to every suggestion (even if it requires spending a considerable amount of time outdoors in the heat and humidity of a Midwest summer when her body already feels too warm for comfort most of the time). They insist on "the best pizza in town" for their inaugural meal, and she chows down, then finds herself popping antacids like candy an hour later. But she doesn't complain, not a peep. She's going to be cordial, and pleasant, and employ every Southern grace ingrained in her as a child. If there's going to be an awkward moment while they're here, she's sure as hell not going to be the cause of it.

At least, that's the plan. But as is all too often the case these days, pregnancy puts a crimp in her agenda.

Charlotte doesn't sleep well. Air travel hadn't been all that kind to her, and her back's been achy ever since. The monkey has been wide awake at all hours and making no secret about it - and also seems to love aiming kicks directly at her bladder, a penchant that has her up and peeing every hour or two. And to top it all off, her belly's been itchy all night, plaguing her with an unnerving feeling of slowly stretching skin. She swears she can feel herself growing overnight, so when she finally gives up on more sleep in the morning, she's unsurprised to find the muscles of her belly are achy and tender. Simply moving around is accompanied by a dull ache, and heaven forbid she dare something as strenuous as a cough. Just what she needs on a day that's supposed to be spent at the Akron Zoo.

But she's not complaining, damnit, she's going to muscle through. She plasters a pleasant smile on her face, and reminds herself that she's worked through aches and pains before, this can't be much harder. Breakfast isn't so bad - she manages to get comfortable in one of the kitchen chairs and just tries not to move too much. The effort of getting showered, dressed and ready for the day, however, has her concerned about her stamina. She's stronger than this, she tells herself. It's just a muscle ache, she insists silently. Part and parcel of the whole babymakin' business. If they were in LA, she'd be going about her workday as normal.

But as the day progresses, she changes her mind on that one, and decides that if they were in LA, she'd be home. Sitting in the most supportive chair she could find, and trying not to make any sudden or drastic movements. But she grins and bears it, waddles her slowly expanding ass all around the zoo, and aches, and exhausts herself. When Mason veers them toward a gift shop outside one of the specialty exhibits, she tells Cooper she'll sit this one out.

The grin that hasn't left his face since they arrived at the zoo this morning dims just slightly, and he asks, "Everything okay?"

"Yeah," she assures, with that fake smile she's rather proud of herself for selling all day long. "Just need to rest my prego ass for a minute. Besides, it's not like I'm gonna buy anything in there. Your parents will make sure Mason gets everything he wants and then some."

Cooper smirks, admits, "Yeah, that's true," and presses a kiss to her brow before she makes her way to a bench just outside the gift shop. Charlotte sits, gingerly, wincing as the movement makes the ligaments low on her belly spasm painfully, glad that for a few minutes she can just indulge herself in the pain instead of trying to cover it up. She's pushed herself, she knows. She's ignored her pregnant body, and pushed against what it was so clearly telling her this morning - take it easy today, let them go by themselves, they don't need you - and she has a feeling she's going to be paying for it.

She tips her head back against the wall and lets her eyes drop shut, her palms rubbing slowly over her bulge. If she can just sit for a while, she'll be alright... This was stupid... She should've just swallowed her pride and made herself look bad yet again. I mean, who'd really have blamed her? She's pregnant, she has every right to sit one out now and again. Stupid, stupid...

They spend half an hour in the gift shop, and Charlotte spends all thirty minutes breathing steadily, and letting her body finally have the rest it wants.

**.:.**

Okay, so, maybe they went a little overboard on gifts. Cooper considered stopping his parents at one point, figuring there will be another, larger gift shop before they leave. But they're Mason's grandparents, and it's their money, so if they really want to spend it on two t-shirts, a stuffed octopus, a keychain, and three books, well... who is he to stop them?

To be honest, it gives him a thrill to watch his parents spoil his son. He always dreamed of being a dad, of giving them a grandchild to dote over - and soon they're going to have two. They could manage to act a little more enthused about the baby on the way, he thinks, but he knows how they still feel about Charlotte. Maybe by the end of the week, they'll come around? He can only hope.

Speaking of Charlotte...

They exit the gift shop, and Mason is the first to spy her.

"Is Momma okay?" he asks, and Cooper follows his gaze. Charlotte is a few feet away, sitting on a bench, her purse slumped next to her, eyes shut, hands on her belly, mouth drawn into a frown of discomfort.

Cooper's heart drops into his stomach. Something's wrong.

But he tells Mason, "I'm sure she's fine. I'll go talk to her." He gestures to the vending machine nearby, and says, "Why don't you grab a pop or something, okay?"

Mason gives him that look that lets him know he's well aware he's being given the brush-off, but lets his grandparents steer him away anyway. Cooper steps closer to Charlotte, and says, "Hey, you alright?"

As soon as she hears him, her eyes open, and she snaps from a frown to a contented smile. It's totally fake - and it's been on her face all day, he realizes. She's been hiding from him.

"Yeah, I'm fine," she tells him. "Just restin' my eyes."

"No, you're not," he mutters, sitting next to her. "I saw that - the way you were frowning, and then not frowning. What's going on?"

"I'm fine," she insists again, and Cooper just gives her a doubtful look. She frowns, purses her lips, then admits, "I'm sore. But I _am_ fine - it's just growin' pains. Bein' on my feet all day hasn't helped any."

Cooper makes a sympathetic face and settles a hand gently on her belly. "You should've said something."

"I didn't want to ruin the day for you guys," she excuses with a shrug. "Truth be told, I probably should've stayed at your parents', but... I didn't want to seem like, I don't know... Like I was shirkin' the opportunity to spend time with the family and using the pregnancy as a convenient excuse?"

"Nobody would have thought that," he insists, rubbing his palm slowly over her belly in a vain attempt to soothe her aches.

"Your mother would've," she insists, and he opens his mouth to protest but she gives him this look. This you-know-I'm-right look, and truth be told, she probably is. He hates this - hates that this parents can't just love her like he does. Hates that they can't see past ancient history to realize how great she is now - how great of a wife and mother she's become. And now here they are, with her in pain, and pushing herself when she should be resting, all because she doesn't want to make their impression of her even worse. This whole thing is just... stupid.

"Well, then you know what? She can think that," he finally says. "I'd rather you take care of yourself."

Charlotte shrugs her shoulder and tells him, "Too late now. Although, really, now that I've been sittin' for a while, it's not so bad."

"Then let's get you home so you can sit some more."

"Aren't you supposed to go see the sea lions?"

They are, and Mason was really looking forward to it, but it wouldn't be the first time plans have had to change to accommodate Charlotte and the baby, and surely it won't be the last. "Yeah, but… we can come back another time. Or, y'know, you can come with us. We'll be sitting the whole time, so you should be fine, right?"

"Sittin' on what?" she asks with a grimace. "We talkin' chairs, or cement bleachers with no back support?"

Cooper sighs, and admits, "Probably the latter."

"Yeah, that's not gonna do me any good." She finds his hand on her belly, weaves their fingers together and stills him before suggesting, "How about this: you guys go see the sea lions, and I will hit up the food court. I could use a snack, anyway. Monkey's hungry."

"You sure?"

"Mmhmm," she insists. "You guys still get to see your show, and I can sit and relax, check some emails, kill time. When you're done, we'll head home."

She looks sincere, but after a whole day of moseying around like she wasn't miserable, he's not sure he can trust how she looks. "It's okay if you want to head back now," he assures her. "They'll understand — I'll make sure they understand."

"Cooper," she soothes with a smile. "I'm okay. Really. Let's go get some food, before I make ya late for the sea lions."

"Alright," he relents, standing and taking her purse without a word. She's not lifting a single thing for the rest of the day as far as he's concerned. He offers her a hand, as he says, "If you're sure."

"I'm sure," she promises, taking his hand and hoisting herself up. She winces as she rises and Cooper very nearly calls this whole thing off, but then she's shooting him a pre-emptive glare. One of those looks she gives him when she thinks he's about to fuss over her excessively, so he swallows the urge and just loops his arm around her shoulder.

Half an hour later, they have her parked in the food court with a plate of chicken fingers and fries, Mason has been assured that she's just tired from all the walking and that the sea lion bleachers wouldn't be very good for her achy back, and that she needs him to go have a good time and tell her every single detail that she's missing.

The sea lions are great, but Cooper misses a lot of the show. He's too busy worrying, and texting her until she tells him in no uncertain terms to LEAVE ME ALONE AND ENJOY OUR DAMNED KID.

He tries, but his mind is with the achy muscles in the food court.


	18. Chapter 18

On their last day in Ohio, his mother surprises him by saying, "She's good with Mason."

"What?" Cooper looks up from his cereal.

"Charlotte," his mother concedes. They're alone at the breakfast table; everyone else is still asleep. He'd woken early, and foraged a bowl of Cheerios to snack on until they get around to real breakfast. "She's good with Mason."

She says it reluctantly, like it pains her to admit this, and knowing how she feels about Charlotte, it probably does. He didn't think the week they'd spent together had done much to dull the animosity between his wife and his mother, no matter how well they seemed to have gotten along if you didn't know any better and weren't looking too hard. It seems he'd been wrong in his assumption.

"Yeah," he tells her with a smile. "She is." He scowls a little and admits, "Sometimes I even think she's better at the whole parenting thing than me."

"Nonsense," his mother scoffs, and he's glad for the reassurance, even though he meant what he said. She has these moments of success where he's failed with Mason, and it always irks him a little. He thinks it's her ability to be logical despite how much she loves them both, and if that's the key to the moments she shines, she can keep it. He'd rather love their kid irrationally and make a few mistakes, leave the logic and tough love to her. "She doesn't hold a candle to you," his mother continues, and she seems grateful for the chance to cut Charlotte down or buoy him up, Cooper's not sure which. "You're a wonderful father," she gushes. "Just... Wonderful. Seeing you with Mason makes your father and I so proud."

"Thanks, mom," he says, as she reaches over and gives his arm an affectionate squeeze.

"I guess what I'm trying to say is... She seems to be good with your son, and I see how fulfilling being a father is for you, and how much you love your family, so I want you to know..." She takes a deep breath. "We will try to be more supportive about the new baby."

Cooper grins, a thrill of relief or excitement or gratitude - God, he doesn't even know - bubbling up in his chest. "Does this mean you don't hate her anymore?" he asks, and then immediately regrets it, because that's not what she said at all, and she could really be about to burst his new little bubble of happiness.

Sure enough, she exhales, her expression sour. She manages, "I don't hate her," and hey, that's progress, at least. "But I wouldn't go so far as to say I like her."

"I'll take what I can get," Cooper says, and any more discussion of Charlotte is cut short by Mason wandering into the room, rubbing his eyes sleepily and asking how long til breakfast.

The morning goes smoothly, and as they're loading up the car to head back to the airport, Cooper sees his mother pull Charlotte aside and hand her a small box. He lingers close enough to eavesdrop, and hears her say, "It's just a little something for you - for the baby."

"Thank you," Charlotte murmurs, sounding surprised and touched. She looks at his mother, adds, "I love your boys," with all the heartfelt sincerity she can muster, and his mother says that she knows, and then that they'd better finish loading the car.

Cooper takes that as his cue to move, and it's not until a few minutes later that he tracks Charlotte down again, in the tiny guest bathroom. He knocks, and she tells him it's open, and he hears her sniffle slightly as he turns the knob. She's wiping tears away, and muttering something about stupid hormones.

Cooper smiles at her, and asks, "What did she give you?"

Charlotte shakes her head, like it's nothing, like this isn't actually kind of a big deal. "Just a gesture," she says, shifting the box on the edge of the sink, turning it toward him.

It's not just a gesture. It's a tiny, gleaming silver spoon.

"It's for the baby," she insists, but they both know better.

It's an heirloom, something meant to keep. A token of acceptance and acknowledgement that she's not just a passing phase anymore. That maybe his parents see their family as legitimate, and with the potential to stick around.

As gestures go, this one is pretty monumental.


	19. Chapter 19

"Hey, I just realized," Mason says to her one day. "The monkey's gonna be born right before Christmas, isn't he?"

They're sacked out in the living room, reading together. Well, not together, exactly - he's supposed to be working his way through a reading assignment for school (but clearly his mind is other places), and she has her nose in the latest Janet Evanovich novel. Cooper is in the kitchen, cooking a dinner that already has her stomach rumbling hungrily.

Charlotte looks up from her book, and tells him, "Mmhmm. I'm due December 17th."

"Huh." He has a little smile on his face, and he adds, "That's cool."

She chuckles and shakes her head, closes her book and sets it aside. "Not really. Your uncle Duke is a December baby, too, and he's always hated it. Says it means he has to wait all darned year to get any presents at all, and then gets 'em all at once, with his birthday and Christmas piggybacked right on top of each other."

Mason considers that. "I never thought of that. That would probably suck."

"Mmhmm." Charlotte stretches her toes out, arches her back lightly, and ignores the tender twinge of her back at the movement. Maybe she can talk Cooper into a back rub later... "When he was little, he'd ask me to trade birthdays. He was all jealous I got summer presents _and_ Christmas presents." The baby's been surprisingly still since she settled on the sofa, but she feels him start to stir now, aiming a few kicks at her insides. "And then when he got older, he insisted we stop celebratin' his actual birthday at all, and started throwin' himself half-birthday parties in June."

Mason wrinkles his noise and gives her a bewildered grin. "You can do that? Just change your birthday?"

"No," she smirks. "But I think December babies get a pass." She runs her hand over her belly, lets it rest on the side. The baby kicks again, and she feels it against her palm. "Besides, it's easier for everyone else that way, anyway. They don't have to worry about buyin' Christmas and birthday presents at the same time. Less pressure, and easier on the pocketbook. You wanna feel him kick?"

Mason perks up a little at that. She's just now at the point where the kicks can be felt from the outside, and Mason has yet to catch one. "Really?"

"Mmhmm."

"Sure!" As she shifts herself until she's sitting up properly, he bounds from the easy chair over to her side and plops onto the couch next to her. He holds his hand out and asks, "Where do I feel?"

Charlotte takes his hand and settles it on her belly, pressing hers over it. "Right here. Just wait a second..."

Mason screws up his face in concentration, and stares at her rounded tummy, like he can get the baby to move by the sheer force of his will. Charlotte feels a light kick, but Mason doesn't stir, so she asks, "You feel that?" His face falls, and he tells her no, and then the baby wallops her again and Mason perks up immediately.

"Yeah!" he corrects. "Was that it?"

"Mmhmm," she confirms with a smile, and Mason presses his hand harder against her, murmuring _cool_, and waiting for another. His baby brother indulges him, and he gets another kick, and then one more, and then Charlotte feels the kid roll inside her. "Aw, he moved," she tells Mason, with a sympathetic frown, drawing their hands away. "Don't think you'll feel him again right now."

"That's really cool," he says again, adding, "He was kicking a lot."

"Yeah, he does that," Charlotte mutters, half irritation, half amusement. "Especially when I'm tryin' to relax, like right now."

"Really?" Mason sits back a little, and says, "I thought he'd relax when you're relaxed."

"You'd think," she says, "But apparently when I'm movin' around, he gets kinda lulled and rocked, so assumin' I'm not really stressed out, it's all relaxin' in there for him. And then when I take a breather, and try to read, or sleep, or take a bath he wakes up and kicks the bejeezus outta me."

Mason snickers at her and presses his hand to her belly again. He's in the wrong spot, and the baby's moving more than kicking right now, but she lets him leave his hand there anyway. "Does he ever wake you up?"

"Yes," she replies, emphatically, with a roll of her eyes. "He does - when he lets me get to sleep at all. Lately, he likes kickin' up a storm just as I'm layin' down for bed. I'll be just about to nod off, and then bam - kicked."

"Does it hurt?"

"Nah. Feels kinda like..." She frowns, tries to find a way to describe it. "It's sorta like popcorn poppin' in my belly. Just these little pops smackin' into my insides, y'know? He's gettin' stronger now, though, so they feel more like actual kicks. Dependin' on where he aims 'em, it can be uncomfortable, but I wouldn't say it hurts just yet."

As Mason looks up at her and declares, "Weird," Cooper pokes his head into the living room.

"Dinner's ready," he announces, and then he looks at Mason's hand and asks, "What're you guys up to?"

"I felt him kick!" Mason tells his dad, excitedly, and Charlotte watches as Cooper's face lights up to match his son's. Lord, she's lucky to have these two. Three, the thinks, correcting herself. She has three Freedman boys now - lucky gal that she is.

"Aw, yes!" Cooper celebrates, making his way over and crouching in front of them on the sofa. He drops his hand onto Charlotte's belly too, and she rolls her eyes. It seems the more pregnant she gets, the more people want to touch her. "He finally did it for you?"

"Uh huh," Mason tells him. "But he was over here."

"He moved," Charlotte reminds, "And now he's not kickin' as much, so _I_ would like to move, and go have some of your daddy's cookin'." She nudges both their hands away and announces, "Monkey's hungry. Let's eat."

And that's all it takes to send them toward the kitchen. Cooper helps Charlotte up off the sofa, and Mason is already halfway to the table by the time they make it into the other room. Cooper's made stir-fry, and while Charlotte stuffs her face rather ungracefully (she's starving these days, the baby burning her appetite into a bottomless pit), Mason tells them all about the new play they're supposed to be doing at school this fall, and the baby in her belly takes livens up and starts kicking again.

It's a domestic scene she was never quite sure she'd see herself in, but now that she's here, she couldn't be more content.


	20. Chapter 20

Cooper now shares his bed with Charlotte and approximately 18 pillows. I mean, okay, that's a bit of an exaggeration, but sometimes it feels that way. She has two under her head, one between her knees, one under her belly and lately one wedged against her back. She's surrounded, ringed in a fortress of synthetic down, and Cooper finds himself both forced further and further toward the edge of the bed and yearning to reach her across the chasm between them.

And then sometimes she rolls - okay, every night she rolls, usually a dozen or so times. And every time she has to fix her pillows, hauling them with her, readjusting, punching them back into fullness and grumbling about it. And waking him up.

She's not sleeping well, so he's not sleeping well, and Cooper has finally decided that something needs to be done about it.

So here he is, at the store, hunting down a solution to their problem. He finds what he's looking for: a large curved pillow made just for mamas-to-be and their bulging bellies and achy hips. He tosses one into his cart, then figures it's worth it to have a spare and grabs one more. And then he finds a regular body pillow and takes that as well for good measure.

When he hauls them into the house a half hour later, Charlotte looks up at him with all sorts of pleased affection. Score one for Team Dad, he thinks.

"What's all this?" she asks with a smile.

"I'm drowning in pillows," he sighs. "So I got you better ones, that are actually meant for pregnant women."

Charlotte chuckles and stands, making her way over to him and dropping a kiss on his lips. "You're sweet, you know that?"

"I did know that, yeah," he jokes, heading for the stairs. "But it's a selfish gift. If I have to wake up to the pillow swap one more time..."

Charlotte rolls her eyes. "Well, I'm terribly sorry my discomfort is keepin' you up at night."

"Not anymore," he announces as he hits the bottom step. "C'mon, Momma. Let's go put these on the bed."

"You need two people for that job?" she questions, ascending the stairs with him despite her question.

"Nah," he shrugs, almost unseating one of the pillows slung over his shoulder. "I also figured we could put some pillows back on the guest bed, since, y'know, you've stolen all of them."

Charlotte chuckles and reminds him, "Pregnant lady's prerogative."

They get all the pillows swapped out, and that night Charlotte rolls into bed and situates herself with a sigh. They've gone from 18 million to four, and Cooper can finally reach her again without fear of a midnight pillow fight. She rolls in the night, and he doesn't notice a blessed thing.


	21. Chapter 21

It's happened. She'd heard this day might come - feared its arrival, to be honest, and now it's here.

She's only just made it to her lunch hour and already it's unbearable. The pinching, the aching pain. This is all just so damned unfair. Isn't it enough that she has to put up with the other unfortunate aspects of babymakin' - the night sweats, the migraines, the heartburn and the muscle aches.

And now this.

She frowns and toes off her favorite shoes - her classy-but-comfortable, perfect-for-pregnancy low heels - and it takes more effort than she'd like. But the relief is immediate, and she sighs, wiggling her pedicured toes - hot pink, this time - and dutifully ignoring the indentation along her foot where the shoes had been digging in.

There's a sales guy at her side in moments, all put-together and fashionable, and friendly with just a hint of sass. Gay, she concludes. In her head, she scorns him for never having to go through this crap himself - and then he says to her, "Hello there, beautiful mama-to-be. What can I get for you today?" with so much kindness and sympathy she almost feels bad for thinking ill of him.

Almost, but not quite.

"My shoes don't fit anymore," she tells him. "And it's depressin' the hell out of me."

He makes a sympathetic face and assures her he'll take good care of her, that she'll leave with something gorgeous.

She walks out of the store an hour later with her old favorite heels tucked into a shopping bag, crammed in there with four more shoe boxes.

On her feet, she's wearing brand new flats, one size larger than her usual.


	22. Chapter 22

They read together. It's something they do.

Mason is required a certain amount of reading for school, but Charlotte likes to carve out a little extra reading time with him on top of it. It's good for them, she thinks, especially now. The more pregnant she's gotten, the more obvious this whole impending baby thing has become, the more she's noticed him acting out. Little things, small protests, meant to get attention more than anything. Like he thinks they need a reminder that he's still there.

So she thinks these times, the quiet reading hours at the end of the day, are good for the two of them. It's his time with her, and her alone. If there's another baby boy in the bed with them, well, they don't talk all that much about him unless Mason wants to.

Tonight, it seems he does.

They're reading Charlotte's Web, a book both Mason's parents were horrified to learn Erica and the Los Angeles Unified School District had managed to overlook thus far. They're not too terribly far into it, and as Mason discovers how good it is, Charlotte is reminded how much she liked it herself when she was a kid.

She turns a page to read another line, and Mason pipes up, "Hey, Momma?"

"Yeah, sweetie?"

"Do you and my dad have a name for the monkey yet?"

He looks at her, tentative, questioning.

Charlotte tucks her finger into the book to mark their page, then closes it, giving him her full attention. "No, not yet. We haven't been able to settle on anything we both really like."

"Oh." He looks back at the book in her hand, and frowns a little.

"Why?" Charlotte coaxes. "You have a suggestion?"

He shrugs his shoulders, then wriggles a little, leaning against her more fully and tugging the book open again. "Maybe. I dunno. It doesn't matter."

Charlotte shifts her grip and tells him, "It matters to me."

Mason shakes his head, looks at her and says, "I'm still thinking. If I decide I really like it, I'll let you know."

"Well, alright then," Charlotte smirks, turning her attention back to the book and reading the next line.

But she doesn't forget, and the next time the three of them are together - over breakfast, the next morning - she makes a point of bringing it up.

"So…" she begins, settling herself into one of the chairs around the kitchen table as Cooper sets a plate of cheesy scrambled eggs and bacon in front of Mason, then heads back toward the stove to get another plate for Charlotte. "What do you think of Alexander for the baby?"

She aims the question at Cooper, but keeps Mason in the corner of her eye. He perks up ever so slightly, but says nothing.

Cooper, however, has something to say. He makes a face, and says, "Not a fan. Too… something. I don't know. Not a fan."

"So much so you said it three times," Charlotte mutters, and truth be told, she wasn't that much of a fan herself. It was a token offering, something meant to start the conversation, but not end it.

"Twice," Cooper corrects, adding, "I still think we should name him after my grandfather," as he carries both his and Charlotte's breakfasts to the table and takes the seat across from her.

"We're not namin' him Walter," Charlotte denies, picking up her fork as Mason makes a face like he's tasted something sour. "He's not eighty years old."

"Walter?" Mason questions incredulously, and Cooper sighs and gives Charlotte a sarcastic thanks-for-that expression, as Mason says that it's super old. Like, really super old. Nobody names kids Walter anymore, and he should know, because he knows a lot of kids. And Charlotte thinks to herself that if a kid with classmates named Dash, Emirsyn, Colbyn, and Neveah is protesting a name as being too out of touch, they really have problems. "But it is like Walt Disney," he adds after a moment. "So that's kinda cool."

"See?" Cooper argues. "Walter's a good name."

"I don't think that's what he was sayin'," Charlotte smirks, taking another bite of her eggs. They could do with some hot sauce, she thinks, but then she has to weigh whether the extra flavor is worth the inevitable discomfort of heartburn this early in the day.

She decides against it as Cooper suggests, "Okay, my dad, then? Russell?"

"Blech," Mason declares, and Charlotte tries hard not to snicker, then offers a slightly more civilized response of, "It doesn't go with Mason."

"It has to go with Mason?"

"If we're gonna be introducing them together, and signin' holiday cards and all that, yeah." She sips her juice, then adds, "I mean, c'mon. Happy Christmukkah from Charlotte, Cooper, Mason, and…" She drops her voice, makes it monotone and boring for, "Russell."

Mason snickers.

"I hate when you two gang up on me," Cooper says, pouting into his eggs. "And there's a whole Jewish tradition, you know - naming people after relatives, especially relatives who are no longer with us. And we _are_ Jewish - at least, I'm Jewish, and I wouldn't mind throwing in a Jewish tradition now and then."

"I agreed to a bris," she reminds him. "And isn't the baby naming thing supposed to be inspired by relatives, but not directly naming them after them? Sharin' initials or somethin' like that?"

Cooper frowns. "Well... yeah, it can be that, too."

"So," Charlotte reaches for her juice. "How about... Wyatt? You've got the W for Walter."

"We're not birthing a cowboy," Cooper points out.

"I like Wyatt," Mason says, his mouth half full of food. Charlotte doesn't even bother scolding, just levels him with a glare that he must understand immediately, because he rolls his eyes and makes a big show of chewing and swallowing.

"It's a name that's gainin' in popularity," Charlotte reasons, turning her attention back to Cooper.

"Maybe in Hick-town, Alabama-"

Charlotte feels a flash of irritation and asks, "Must you always insult my heritage? I don't rip on yours."

"Okay, well, first of all, sometimes you do," he insists, and then, "And either way, I don't like Wyatt."

There's a low burn of ill will simmering under Charlotte's skin, and rather than let them slide into a real, honest-to-goodness argument over breakfast, she turns her focus to Mason.

"How 'bout you?" she asks him. "You got any ideas over there? Anything you really like?"

Mason rolls his eyes at her and says, "I know what you're doing, y'know."

"Well, then, why don't you just give it up and tell me?" Charlotte asks teasingly, and Mason huffs a little sigh.

"Fine," he mutters, spooling some cheese around the tines of his fork before finally giving up the goat: "I thought maybe Avery. Like Fern's brother, in the book. And it's not stupid and old or anything like that."

Charlotte smiles, and looks at Cooper. "Avery, huh? I think I like that."

"It's not bad," Cooper agrees, testing it out again. "Avery Freedman. A little girly, though."

"I think gender distinction has largely gone out the window these days," Charlotte excuses, pointing out that of the three Masons in their son's class, only two are boys.

"I know a girl Avery and a boy Avery," Mason supplies as confirmation. "So it works for both, I think."

Cooper cedes their point, and Charlotte lists off the whole family unit, slowly, weighing the feel and the fit, "Charlotte, Cooper, Mason, and Avery."

"See? It fits," Mason insists, and Charlotte has to agree with him. It fits. It works. Truth be told, unisex names aren't something she'd normally steer toward, but she's not so averse to them that she won't consider this one.

"It does, indeed," she agrees, adding, "We'll have to add it to the short list."

The short list never gets very long, and Avery holds the top spot the whole time running. And as if to will it into being, and probably because it worked so well with "monkey," Mason stops calling the baby anything other than Avery, until he gets Charlotte into the habit, too, and eventually Cooper. Avery Warren Freedman gets his name out of sheer brotherly persistence — eventually, they just can't imagine him as anything else.


End file.
